“Amma, there’s a monster in my room.”

I was scared of the dark for a long time as a child. I never went to sleep without a nightlight, and I couldn’t stand sleeping alone. It was a deep fear, being alone, imagining what was out there in the deep dark corners of my home. I saw the monsters in my room, living in the shadows of the windows, wrapped around my bed. They lived in the depths of my closet and the basement of our house- in all the scary nooks and crannies of our house. I hated these monsters as they appeared to besiege me as soon as I was alone, so I clung to anyone near to shield me from these fears.

I clung onto this fear for a very long time, ignoring the absurdity of the situation-although to a five year old, this is a very serious problem. People tried to tell me that it’s alright, that they don’t exist. My parents always would assure me, “It’s fine, see?”, as they lifted out the covers of the bed, pointed out that the space underneath, which was completely empty.

As I grew older I gradually grew out of this fear, shrugging it off as a silly childish notion, something that wasn’t real. Maybe the monsters I saw underneath my bed weren't real, but there were monsters out there. I just didn’t see it.

I believe that as we grow older, we never truly stop believing in our monsters. They simply change with us. My childhood fears changed as I grew, twisting into a fear of something different: acceptance. I stop worrying about the shadows in my room, and instead I thought about how people would view me.  I used to be afraid of being alone because of the monsters I saw, but now I was afraid of being along for entirely different reasons. I realized that my old monsters had been there all along, they had just moved from the shadows of my room into my own shadow, following me around.

This readily became apparent in the later years of elementary school as more and more people became concerned with how they appeared to others. People would worry if they were ¨cool¨ or not, of what their friends would think of them. I was easily among these people, especially since I had switched schools at the start of fourth grade. I had been accepted in a magnet program, but none of my fiends had. So there, at this new school, teeming with shadows, I was completely and utterly alone. My shadows wrapped around me, whispering in my ear and making me hyper aware of what the other kids were doing, and of everything they might be thinking.

she's looking, no wait-

                                  look at that expression-   about me
is that scorn? disgust? what's she doing? (need to know)
            oh no/no/no what did I do wrong?      my clothes, my actions, my face, (whatwhatwhat)
                  they think i'm weird-(no) now she's talking to that other girl-
(is it/possibly/no) about me?!  (what are they saying)
             I don't want them to, (what do they think of me) 
                           i just want them to [need/please] like me
(accept me)

This rapidly spiraled, as I became so concerned with the opinions of my peers that I hadn't realized I had only isolated myself even more. Then suddenly I was a child again, cowering in a room full of shadows, the monsters only I could see, whispering about me. My own personal monster only thrived under this new environment, my fears continually reminding me of how the other kids through about me and what I had made them think through my misguided efforts to do the opposite.

The pinnacle of my fears manifested in a girl. She was pretty, popular and funny. She drew people to her like a magnet, basking in their attention. I looked up at her in awe, desperately wanting to be part of her world. She was everything I wanted to be, everything I had tried to become.

I didn't realize that she was a monster too.

For the purpose of this narrative, I’ll refer to her as Jane. I thought that if I managed to make friends with Jane, then everything would be better. I would suddenly be like her, surrounded by my own circle of friends, and finally free of the monster in my shadow. I didn’t realize that she was a monster too, and soon, I was caught in her gaze. My monster was my fear of loneliness, but she seemed much worse. It was the judgement that lingered in her eyes as she looked on people. It wasn’t her fears that tore her down, but she who tore others down, and so she had become the monster. My attempts at friendship were rebuffed and I was immediately the target of her judgement. Instead of my own doubts convincing myself that I wasn’t good enough, it was Jane who convinced me of that with scathing words and insults. She nurtured the monster in my shadow, and with both of them whispering in my ears, they made a formidable team against my self worth.

I want to say that it wasn't like that. I want to say that I stood up to her in a blaze of defiance, that I managed to slay the monster and live happily ever after. But life is so rarely so ideal. I never stood up to her. I never managed to do what I should have. It took the next two years until I managed to finally escape the vicious cycle by graduating to middle school, far away from Jane. Now, looking back on this, I realize that although she was the one who tormented me, I was the one who let her.

It took a long time for me to learn to ignore the monsters, the fears and doubts that crept up on me, and start being myself. I realized that my fear of loneliness was, similar to my fear of shadows as a child, something foolish. I didn’t need to be controlled by my fears, because I was the one who controlled my life, not my monsters, and I wouldn’t be alone.

I’ve found that it’s impossible to truly get rid of our monsters. They’ve become a part of us, and thus they grow and change along with us. But this doesn't mean you need to be controlled by them. My fears made me who I am, as I gradually learned to conquer them and change myself in the process. There are still the doubts that creep up on me, the silent looks of judgement and the lingering fear that I’m not good enough, that I’ll be alone. It’s just a matter of ignoring these fears and proving them wrong. I’m not alone. I’m not afraid. And for now, that’s enough.